Trump DOJ memo cites Olmstead to push institutions

DOJ memo – The Trump administration’s Justice Department released a memo on the Olmstead v. L.C. disability case—an effort legal experts warn could be used to roll back protections meant to keep people with mental illnesses out of psychiatric institutions, even as the me

For years, Olmstead v. L.C. has been a key legal restraint on the impulse—by states and institutions—to warehouse people with disabilities in psychiatric facilities. On Thursday. the Department of Justice released a memo quietly returning to that 1999 landmark case. and it makes a claim that has alarmed disability rights experts: that the legal framework it helped build is tied to increases in homelessness and. in effect. should be revisited.

The memo points to Olmstead v. L.C. a disability civil rights case that curbed states’ power to institutionalize people diagnosed with mental illnesses. along with “related federal civil rights laws.” In the administration’s framing. the combination of those precedents and statutes increases homelessness. For critics. that argument lands less like a careful legal interpretation and more like an invitation to expand institutionalization in restrictive psychiatric settings.

Sam Bagenstos. a University of Michigan law professor. said the administration’s claims are “not rooted in fact.” Bagenstos. who served as general counsel for the Department of Health and Human Services and the Office of Management and Budget during the Biden administration. called the Olmstead decision “one of the most effective tools in combating homelessness.” He argues that it pushed states to expand mental health and housing services outside institutions.

Bagenstos’ concern runs beyond the memo’s conclusions to the process behind them. He said the White House instructed the Justice Department to produce the document. To him, that detail suggests the administration is preparing something bigger.

“It suggests we might potentially be seeing an executive order,” Bagenstos said, describing a possible effort directing the Justice Department and the Department of Health and Human Services to roll back rules meant to avoid institutionalization.

The issue is not abstract. Disability rights attorneys and advocates have treated Olmstead protections as a civil rights floor. Alison Barkoff, a George Washington University law professor, warned that the administration is moving in the wrong direction.

“This administration is trying to take away one of the most fundamental rights that people with disabilities have fought for,” Barkoff said.

Her worry is not theoretical either. Barkoff said the memo’s approach is “completely inconsistent with virtually all courts.” She also pointed to a different enforcement stance during her time as a DOJ special counsel on Olmstead enforcement during the Obama administration.

In December. the Department of Justice reached an agreement with South Carolina to expand supportive services for people with psychiatric disabilities to reduce rates of institutionalization. That stands in stark contrast to the memo’s logic and to the broader fear among critics that the White House is working to loosen the constraints that keep people out of institutions.

Barkoff and Bagenstos both describe the memo as part of a wider pattern of pressure on the legal framework that protects disabled people from being forced into care settings that function like warehousing.

Bagenstos characterized the memo’s approach as “part of the incredibly punitive approach toward homelessness and mental illness that Trump has taken from the beginning of his administration. ” pointing to a July executive order. That order called for unhoused people with mental health conditions to be forced into long-term care settings—actions he said conflict with Olmstead and disability civil rights laws.

The danger. critics say. is that an attempt to restrict the Olmstead framework could also worsen homelessness—the very outcome the memo claims it is trying to address. Barkoff and Bagenstos warn that if protections are weakened, the system may swing back toward institutionalization rather than supportive services.

The White House did not respond immediately to a request for comment on its plans for Olmstead enforcement, or the lack of such plans.

For advocates. the most unsettling part may be what is happening beneath the surface: a Justice Department memo built around Olmstead. produced at the White House’s instruction. using homelessness as the rationale—while disability rights experts say the facts don’t support the conclusion and the legal interpretation conflicts with the courts.

Olmstead v. L.C. Department of Justice memo psychiatric institutionalization disability rights homelessness Trump administration executive order South Carolina supportive services Alison Barkoff Sam Bagenstos civil rights laws HHS